For well over a century, women played controversial roles in the advertising industry, many as copywriters struggling in a male-dominated industry. But a dozen rose to the upper echelons of their companies and were elected to the AAF Hall of Fame, the industry’s highest honor.

The AAF hall recognizes men and women in ad agencies, ad media and in the companies that purchase significant amounts of advertising.

Stephen F. Fox wrote in "The Mirror Makers" that women held a wide variety of jobs in the fledgling ad business in the decades following the Civil War. But men dominated the industry by 1923 when Erma Perham Proetz began her career as a copywriter.